hikerfast
Active member
always wanted to do this. Parked at lincoln woods, and took the service road out to the wilderness trail. I jogged out to stillwater junction in an hour and 55 in new boots, which performed well. beautful day..trails wet from last nights rain in spots..but brooks not high. wiped out on crystal brook crossing but just a banged elbow and more reason to not cross brooks..ha. I had been stopped by this at high water, so it was all new from here on in! After all these years I finally reached the junction and saw trails and places I had never seen. Signs for Desolation trail, shoal pond trail, seeing carrigain brook. there were some sneaky views of the bonds and the back side of carrigain on the way. really nice woods out there, not too thick, very scenic. the east branch is about 20 feet across there and not deep. I took the shoal pond trail(all new) and crossed the east branch on stones. The first couple miles of this trail is somewhat hard to follow in spots but not too bad. There are several crossing, maybe 4. Lot of mud and log bridges, pretty woods but not much for views. I could see peeks of zealand notch, then the bonds when I got to shoal pond, which was very nice. I don't think this would be bad to ski in winter, but I wouldn't be surprised if anyone got off trail. Best to make sure of your compass bearing in winter. I saw an old hippie and stopped for 10 minute chat. He told me he saw someone(michaelj) reading at thoreau falls. I figured if I started running again maybe I could catch him. He had mentioned in his post he would be out there reading Harry Potter. hour and 16 to the do the shoal pond trail, including the 10 minute chat. Couldnt really jog much on that trail at all, rocky and muddy and crossings and bog bridges. Not the easier to follow in spots, getting overgrown a little. I reached the junction with the ethan pond trail. I was surprised to see the sign said only half mile to thoreau falls. I ran over to there, ran down the 1/10th to the falls, and WHAT A VIEW! great views of the bonds..beautiful waterfall..man i hadn't been out there since maybe 1985. but no Mike. The old hippie told me he(the hippie not mike) had come from the kanc also...and had come in thoreau falls trail. He said it was hard to follow and he had gotten lost in a couple spots. If no one had said Mike was out there, I might have tried doing a loop and going back that way. i jogged and walked thru zealand notch. really nice to be out there in those open spots where the slides come down off of whitewall mountain. I saw a guy on a rock who said he had been there an hour and hadn't seen anyone. I ran down the pleasant trail and thought about going up to the hut, but figured I better make tracks. I ran pretty good out the trail, heard someone yell my name. It was a guy i worked with 10 years ago. Funny, chatted a bit with him. I ran and noticed my leg muscles getting a little sore, but ran all the way to Zealand road. Who was sitting there in a subaru but michael j! He said he was waiting till 4 and I had two minutes. Nice to get a ride for sure back to my car. It would have been a long unreliable hitchhike. He didn't even know if i was going for sure. 4 hours and 34 minutes with a couple stops. I think it was 18 miles. I don't really feel too bad for that long of a jog, ill see what the morning brings. What a day. I think this is skiable, but depending on conditions, probably I would be at the limit of my endurance trying that. Sorry I didn't post this, but I didn't know what I was going to be able to do today depending on what happened with work. I got on the trail at 11:23.
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